The following are reader's opinions of the USS Enterprise (refit) made by Bandai.

Reviewer

Mike Thomas

Date Reviewed

Nov 3, 2003

Overall Rating

Well worth getting.

Comments

I bought both Enterprise (1701 and 1701-E) Bandai kits and received them 2 days ago. I almost immediately went to work on the 1701. The detail and painting of this model are amazing. Unlike others here I am not going to complain about a lack of red here or too much blue there. I expect that designing and production of things are difficult enough that one is probably never going to satisfy everyone. This is the best commercial model of a star trek ship I’ve ever seen. If you’re an absolute perfectionist stop complaining about this one and build and paint your own.

Building the kit took me about 3 ½ hours. Some parts took a lot of force (and I mean A LOT, I was so afraid of breaking them) and there are seams but I am going to attempt to knife down some things and see if I can’t get a better fit. The longest part was working on the wiring connections in the primary hull. I am going to have to solder the wires on as the lights don’t light up after I put the whole thing together. But as soon as I take off most of the primary hull it does light!

I did not find I needed touch up paint. I was careful when I pulled the parts off the part trees and I shaved down the stubs with a exacto knife. I’m very happy with the kit (aside from the seams) and am excited about putting together the E, but it was 3am when I finished the first and didn’t want to tackle the other (it’ll have to wait until this afternoon).

This kit is FAR better than the AMT 1701-D model I built years ago. The pre-painting is beautiful. Truly the best kit I’ve ever seen of the enterprise. Well worth the 60 bucks I spent on it.